


Swinging Party

by elena_stidham



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Anxiety Attacks, Based on a Lorde Song, Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Heavy Angst, Inspired by Fanart, M/M, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Singing, Song Lyrics, Strap in, That's right it's another recovery fic friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-09 05:15:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17995565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elena_stidham/pseuds/elena_stidham
Summary: "Bring your own lampshade, somewhere there's a party. Here it's never ending, can't remember when it started. Pass around the lampshade, there'll be plenty enough room in jail.If being wrong's a crime, I'm serving forever. If being strong's your kind, then I need help here with this feather.If being afraid is a crime, we hang side by side, at the swingin' party down the line."--Lorde





	Swinging Party

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS FOR: HEAVY ASS PTSD, language, violence, slightly nsfw
> 
> SONGS USED TO GET IN THE MOOD: Mostly, “Fragile N.4” by Dustin O’Halloran. Also, I finally developed a playlist for writing AshEiji recovery fics! 
> 
> https://open.spotify.com/user/twijill/playlist/08UcNbQJ83tKPdZnp57XY6?si=W0_P0NqeQZm7Jhwgj5bkgA
> 
> This was inspired by “Swinging Party” by Lorde. However, since I can’t write with lyrics because it’s so hard on my dyslexic ass, I couldn’t listen to it while I wrote. I was also inspired by some sevenflats art but they made it private like very private I had to be on a list to see it so I’m not going to link it. It’s the scene where Ash tries to be seductive. There’s also sfw art referenced here. 
> 
> https://twitter.com/nakimooshi/status/1100654214139637760?s=20
> 
> https://twitter.com/nakimooshi/status/1101184904115630080?s=20
> 
> Originally, this had seven scenes. Then somewhere down the line it turned into fifteen. Oops. That’s why this took for fucking EVER. I’m genuinely too tired to finish my bio and all that other fun stuff that comes with this fic, so please just enjoy. 
> 
> My tumblr is elenastidham, and in the bio there’s links you can follow to support me and my other works further. If you like Zelda, my Zelda tumblr is minuetofthewild. Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoy!
> 
> -Elena

_Bring your own lampshade, somewhere there’s a party._

 

One, two, three four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, three, four. One, two, three, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, one, two, one, two, one, two. Three? Four, four, four, four, four, four four four four _four—_

“ _Eiji_!”

They’re in two different rooms when the anxiety surges through Ash’s lungs in this desperate panic. But somehow, holding tightly onto Earth, white-knuckling his way down is keeping him from flying somewhere far away. It’s a method that’s somehow working, but he has no idea how he’s doing it.

Eiji’s in the room in seconds, his hands somewhere in mid-air, catching himself before he reaches for Ash. Eiji asks him if it’s okay to touch, and it isn’t. So Eiji so just uses his hands as a guide, now, guiding along his own chest to follow along with breathing.

“Please, Eiji,” Ash heaves, his grip on the chair tight. The wood almost seems to be splintering, but it could also be an odd reflection of the light. “I’m almost there. Just talk to me. Talk to me, please.”

Eiji lowers his hands slowly and he nods. “What about?”

“Anything. Anything, please.”

Eiji just swallows hard, mumbling something in Japanese that almost sounds like a divine prayer for help.

“Have I ever told you,” he thinks, almost stalling for a subject. “About my life in Izumo? Growing up?”

“Vaguely,” Ash answers, almost choking on his tongue.

The air is heavy. The weight presses onto their chests and it’s trying to break through the bloodstream into their core. It’s something that is so desperate to hurt and to be hurt, but the people who are hurt are doing everything in their power to push this kind of hurt away.

“Is it a bad subject to talk about?” Eiji asks, sincere.

Ash shakes his head. He loves Eiji. He loves every little living ounce of Eiji. So hearing his life story most _definitely_ does not crush him, but it does not push away the life story that was robbed from him. “Did you always want to pole vault?” He asks; his throat is shaking.

Eiji shakes his head with a soft laugh. “No, I got interested in that in like, middle school. My friend had an older brother who was into it, and that’s what sparked my interest.” He had to think for a moment, trying to remember what came before. “When I was little, like, really little, I wanted to be a singer.”

Ash chuckles in a way that almost sounds like a scoff through the panic reaching behind his eyes. “Did you sing?”

“All the time.”

“Were you good at singing?”

“I don’t think so, no,” Eiji’s laugh is light again, trying to bring humour and liveliness into a conversation that’s only being plagued by the dark.

To Ash, however, it is impossible for Eiji to be anything less than perfect at anything. Even if he wasn’t good at something, he was still perfect. It could be the worst voice he’d ever hear in the world, but it would be completely, unthinkingly perfect. If his singing voice is anything like his speaking voice, it would be the most authentic form of heaven.

“Do you still sing?” Ash asks, a glint in his eyes that almost seem childlike.

Eiji smiles at that. “Sometimes.”

“Can you sing to me?” The tone that’s there isn’t Ash anymore. It’s purely Aslan, holding tightly onto those deep green angel eyes. “Can you sing for me? Sing again?”

Eiji will admit he’s not the most comfortable with his singing voice, but he trusts Aslan with his heart and soul. A simple little song past his lips wouldn’t do anything more than bring him down to Earth entirely again. For Aslan, _anything—_

“Of course,” he smiles warmly. “What do you want me to sing?”

“Anything,” Ash tells him. “Anything, please.”

Eiji doesn’t understand why Lorde of all artists came into his mind, but he decides, maybe to just work with it. Perhaps, her cover at the end of her first album will work just fine.

So he just steps closer, resting a hand on the chair besides Ash’s fingers, but not taking them. He’s close enough to where he can keep his voice softer, but also to look at this boy square with the most tender eyes.

And with that, he sings.

 

_Here it’s never ending, can’t remember when it started._

Ash never knew loneliness had a taste to it until Eiji came, then he rediscovered the wonderful flavours food contained from no longer being alone. He had tasted loneliness again when he was ripped away from Eiji and trapped in this life that was never his own. But again, here comes Eiji, saving him from a world that left him so weak and fragile and desperate for death. Food had never tasted so good after that.

Here in Japan food as a slightly different flavour. It’s a lot more kind on the heart – love had clearly been shared from the soul.

Ash finds himself in their kitchen a lot, cooking with Eiji to make whatever incredible feast they choose to have for that night. For this night, they’ve decided on a simple recipe pork cutlet, complete with many vegetables and types of rice with egg on the side.

Eiji doesn’t notice when he asks Ash to cut the vegetables that his hands had started shaking because he was holding a knife. But he does notice this, however, within the first few slices that almost resemble a soft release of life.

Ash is like this only sometimes, when a particular odd tone or memory strikes through his fragile mind, and the next thing he knows he’s having to fight away the thoughts saying he’s killing somebody.

“Aslan,” Eiji calls softly, knowing the power of his real name.

Ash turns to him but only his eyes belong to Aslan, his hands still tremble. His hands still carry this knife.

Eiji carefully walks over, wrapping his arms around from behind him and carefully holding onto his hands. “Let me do it with you.”

He agrees.

Three slices in and the shaking stops, Eiji now almost entirely controlling what is happening with Ash’s hands. His chest now cradles Aslan, who just watches, and quietly remarks how Eiji smells like a hint of cinnamon.

_Pass around the lampshade there’ll be plenty enough room in jail._

 

Some nights just get so bad.

Nobody means it. Nobody causes it. It’s just a broken fragment of memories left behind that start to take a physical manifestation – but they’re all the more reason to inflict agony on tiny, tiny Aslan.

These attacks aren’t weak. They’re the kind that leaves Ash completely in pieces, the mess it’s made even deadlier than what was initially left behind.

It’s a mess Eiji made the mistake of finding at the wrong time.

Ash didn’t know any better, and he genuinely didn’t, because when the boy walked into the room with this _worry_ in his eyes, he didn’t see Eiji. He saw a man trying to drag him to his bed, a baseball jersey peeling off his back and a tight grip around his wrist that wasn’t even there. He felt like smothering. He could feel his body reaching for a gun in warning, but there was nothing there. The smell that scarred the inside of his nose was nothing short of lust and sweat.

Eiji was nowhere near him, yet he had the misfortune of being in the place of the hallucination.

The punch struck his cheekbone, and it was clear Ash was not holding back by any means. The blow knocks Eiji past his feet, scrambled across the floor and panting, the air starting to push on the two of them as if the world holds no other force in this place. He turns onto his back, propped up by his elbows, just in time to be struck again by Ash. It’s a kick, this time, to his stomach, causing him to curl around his foot in a ball.

“Ash!” Eiji gasps, trying to push himself up onto his knees, but instead, he is hoisted by his hand. He thinks Ash is pulling him up, but Eiji sees a hand coming towards his face again is when he quickly realises he has to duck. In this moment, he saw the faintest glance into Ash’s eyes. Not even Aslan was in there.

“Ash!” He screams again, this time using his body to push Ash onto the bed and pin him there. He _knows_ he can’t be held there like this for long, but he also knows that this boy has no idea where he is or what he’s doing. “Ash! Ash! Aslan!”

The real name, again, triggers something, very faintly, but it still doesn’t pull him back. Ash is screaming now, his face contorted in somewhere of fear and pure, unflinching misery. He’s doing everything he can to push Eiji off of him, but this time, with tears flowing from his eyes, he calls for Eiji, not knowing he’s literally right there.

“Ash, Ash, Aslan,” Eiji calls for him, then he presses himself further down onto Ash, wrapping his arms around him to restrain him still and pressing his face tightly to his chest. He closes his eyes tight, trying to hold onto Ash as best as he can to keep his arms from getting loose again. “I’m right here! It’s me! It’s Eiji! I’m right here!”

Finally, Ash starts to recognise Eiji’s voice. Even still, he does not see Eiji’s face. He calls out to him again, broken sobs and strangled thrashing is just about all that there is holding him together at this point. Eiji will never forget how absolutely shattered his soul sounded when Ash screamed out his name.

“It’s me! It’s Eiji! It’s really me! I’m right here, I’ve got you,” Eiji holds him tightly, his body on the verge of giving out and being shoved off of Ash’s body as if he was made of plush. Tears slip past his tightly sealed eyes, his heart absolutely aching at the agony in his cries. “I’m right here. Come back to me, Ash. Come back to me, Aslan!”

Aslan just has to close his eyes and hold them shut tight, his body giving out before Eiji’s does where they finally both just lay there, with Eiji’s arms holding onto a human that only sobs.

“Eiji, please,” he cries, not opening his eyes. “Help me.”

Eiji’s heart shatters once again, but this time, he takes in a shaky breath, sitting up and looking back down at this fragile boy. “I’m right here, Aslan.” He brings his hands down to cradle onto Aslan’s face, prompting his eyes to snap open in panic. However, between his sobs he finally recognises him, and this is when he just takes Eiji by his wrists and pulls him back down, holding as tight as he can. Eiji does not hesitate to hold him right back.

“Eiji,” he weeps. His body shakes with the tears out of his eyes. “You saved me.” He almost says, _you saved my life,_ but he doesn’t. He leaves it behind.

However, this brief moment of light is extinguished the moment Aslan remembers how he got here, the very moment where he _realises – this is what he’s done to him._

Instantly, Ash pushes himself away, scrambling up onto his feet off the bed and staring back at Eiji with shock coating his wide eyes. He’s begging himself, please don’t say he did this, please don’t say it, say it ain’t so—

“Eiji – _oh my god_ – _Eiji_ ,” his voice is already wavering, but this time, behind those dimly lit eyes, Eiji watches his soul break. “I’m so sorry. I am so fucking sorry. I—” He swallows hard, looking down at his hands. These murderous hands. These fucking hands, all they ever do is take life and they _drain._ “I didn’t mean to—”

“—Aslan,” Eiji speaks, his voice calm and his motions now soft as he sits up and proceeds to push his way off the bed. “It’s okay.”

“It’s _not_ okay!” Ash screams now, looking at him with terror in his eyes. “I…I _hurt_ you!”

“You didn’t hurt me,” Eiji speaks, honest.

“I _hit_ you!” Aslan sobs. “I punched you in the face. I kicked you in the ribs! I was trying to shove you off of me. I was going to _kill_ you!”

“You didn’t know it was me!” Eiji says, reaching for Aslan, now. His body hurts, sure, but that does not mean he is in pain. Ash swipes his hands away, but it is not apart from him for too long. He squeezes those shaking hands tightly, looking at him dead in the eye. “Listen to me. I promise you, I am unharmed.”

Aslan tugs once, but his arms aren’t given to him. He is too afraid to even look at him in the eyes, in case Eiji sees the monster he truly is.

They take a few steps back, and the next thing Ash realises is half of his head is on a pillow with Eiji delicately pulling him close. This is the only person, Ash finds, where his arms are not suffocating.

“I’m so sorry,” Aslan repeats. He will never, ever forgive himself. Even if Eiji could.

And they do.

 

_If being wrong’s a crime, I’m serving forever. If being strong’s your kind then I need help here with this feather._

 

Ash is only used to sex when it comes to his former routine. He’s used to the mannerisms and the voice he would have to put on and the way he’d have to act in order to survive as a prostitute. He’s used to doing what he had to do – the most bare-bones style of sex he could manage to stay alive without breaking that so very thin thread holding his fragile mind.

He knows from the books he’d read in the library to escape from his life that sex is supposed to be something amazing – that proper love is not taken by force. Yet, with Eiji, he has this deeply sickening feeling that time for proper love is running out. That if nothing happens by now, Eiji’s going to leave. Ash would rather rip out his own heart through his neck.

So one night when Eiji is home and getting dressed for bed that night, Ash decides to swallow down his disgust and face the fear that he’s been chasing.

“Hey,” he purrs, licking his lips. He curves his body towards the mattress, the lower half of his body arched to the sky while his head so delicately rests on the palm of his hand. “I’m gonna make you feel so good, _onii-chan._ ”

Eiji turns his head, his breath caught in his throat. Ash is completely, one-hundred percent naked, and Eiji can’t hide the conflict in his eyes and the blush across his cheeks.

“What’s wrong?” Ash coos, the tone in his voice not even real. He pushes himself up and then lays back onto his back, spreading his legs and trailing his fingers up his thigh. “Or do you prefer it face to face? You don’t have to be shy, _onii-chan._ ”

Eiji stares at him for a moment, reading the situation before he realises the silent cry for help behind those angel eyes. Eiji climbs onto the bed, and here Ash holds his breath, waiting for the moment he takes him then and there because that’s what _everyone does—_

But he doesn’t.

Eiji does not bring his lips down onto his skin or anywhere near. The hands that touch him do not grip onto his body and begin to thrust. Instead, it’s a soft glimmer of light that cradles the side of his face, holding him there for just a moment. Lips press onto his forehead, and the most tender eyes gaze onto this broken boy.

“You don’t have to do or say those things for me, I’m not here because of that.”

In this exact moment, the child rips through the cauterised heart and tears begin to slide down both eyes on Ash Lynx’s hollow gaze.

Eiji just leans in, pulling him close, his hug gentle as well as tight. Ash does not reciprocate, his eyes fixated on this one shift in the sheets where he originally laid. The tears do not end here, but they carry a relief so sacred.

“I love you, Aslan,” Eiji says. “I love _you._ ”

 

_If being afraid is a crime, we hang side by side, at the swinging party down the line._

 

Ash has hit the point within his nightmares where he doesn’t wake up.

He’ll still whimper. He’ll still cry. He’ll still scream. Yet despite what horrors are laid out from each screech nothing tears him enough to open his eyes. Neither of them know if this is good or bad.

Tonight is one of those nights, where Ash is halfway sobbing and wheezing through his breaths in a desperate attempt to wake himself up, but he doesn’t open his eyes. His body heaves with his breathing, his eyelids scrunching tighter together in a desperate attempt to fight the demons. They’re winning anyway.

Eiji has grown used to nightmares like these. He noticed he’s been easier to wake up, hearing the faintest cry from Ash’s side will open his eyes within no time at all, and he has to be the one to wake him up.

“Ash,” Eiji calls, hands gently taking his shoulder and shaking lightly. “Get up. It’s just a nightmare.”

“ _Mom_.”

“Aslan,” Eiji reaches over and carefully pets the hair out of his face. The locks are sticking to his skin from the beads of sweat clumping around there. He shakes him again. “It’s okay. It’s just a bad dream.”

A few more shakes does it for him, and the next thing he knows is he’s gasping, bolt upright, his chest aching as if it had been punched square in the chest. His eyes focus on the dark, and he remembers where he is. He turns his head around, his soft sigh is shaking. “Eiji—”

“—Come here,” Eiji opens his arms, but Ash does not crawl into them. Instead, he just flops back onto the bed, the bottom of his palms pressed into his eyes as if it would in the tears slipping out of there.

“It’s okay,” he continues, but Ash turns to his side, his back facing Eiji now.

Eiji watches him for just a moment, before he carefully crawls closer, halfway laying on top of Ash with his temple pressed onto the shaking shoulder. His arms are wrapped around the boy to help soothe his trembles, and he just stays there, knowing that company enough is sometimes all Aslan needs to break through his sobs.

 

_Pound the prairie pavement, losing proposition. Quitting school and going to work and never going fishing._

Disagreements are often. They’re over little things – opinions on natto, finishing thoughts on some movie they chose to watch, whether or not it looks more classy to have the fork and spoon on the left or the right.

However, arguments?

Arguments almost never happen at all. They’re so rare and unfound that it genuinely has to be a wrong place, time, mood, situation scenario. There’s extra factors, but every little thing has to be just wrong enough for it to become something to argue about.

Tonight in particular, Ash was paranoid. Eiji was just tired.

It’s a deadly combination that’s stacked on top of a day that didn’t settle quite right with the two of them. The finale was a simple lack of a response.

When Eiji comes home, he’s visibly exhausted, as if he was handed a situation that takes an entire staff to deal with but he had the misfortune of tackling it by himself – or, in the eyes of someone who had never been in the work force outside of prostitution and murder, it was as if he had just barely escaped being killed or tortured within an inch of his life.

“Where were you?” Ash asks, poison on his tongue.

Eiji wipes his face, staring up at Ash for a moment before blinking and registering the question. “Sorry,” he sighs. “The meeting ran late and the editor started harping on me and Ibe for what felt like hours.”

“You could have at least texted me that!” Ash shouts. Sure, he’s relieved that Eiji is back, but that doesn’t stop the hurt and betrayal in his tone from not being told about what was going on in the first place.

“I definitely would have if my phone wasn’t _dead_ ,” Eiji chuckles lightly, but the exhaustion on his face is still clearly overweighing the humour.

“Sure.”

Eiji’s face changes right then, giving Ash a look with an emotion he can’t quite place. “Do you wanna see how dead it is, Ash?” He snaps. “It’s pretty fucking dead.”

Ash should have known right then to probably drop the argument altogether based on the fact Eiji cursed alone. But Ash is as worried as he is petty, and he’s in the mood to be pretty fucking petty. “You could have had Ibe text me then, at least!”

“I wasn’t thinking about it! Sorry,” Eiji huffs. “It won’t happen next time.”

“There won’t be a next time.”

Eiji scoffs. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me the first time,” Ash turns and looks at him dead in the eyes. “There won’t _be_ a next time.”

“You’re not the boss of me,” Eiji shoots a glare but then turns his eyes in a different direction to not give off any feeling of malice. “Besides, it’s not like I _wanted_ to be chewed out at one o’clock in the morning.”

“Why didn’t you just tell him to save it until the next time you went in?” The question is sincere, but the tone is slightly sassy. Ash’s ignorance about a typical 9-5 job shows through in the little things, and it’s questions like these where Eiji remembers who exactly he’s dealing with about these conversations.

“It doesn’t work like that,” Eiji explains, trying to be as polite as possible despite his very clear annoyance at this overall situation. “Journalism doesn’t have a set schedule, _especially_ when the editor calls for an all-staff.”

Ash makes a face where his eyebrows are furred with anger and his lips turned in an awkward pout. “Then take pictures for someone else,” he mumbles.

“No.”

Now it’s Ash’s turn to scoff. “Excuse me?”

“ _No_ , Ash.”

“What the hell is your problem?” Ash would be lying if he didn’t think he was part of the reason why, but at the same time he would be lying if he didn’t think that Eiji should understand where he’s coming from. He does, but it’s just not a good day.

“I didn’t have one until you started barking up my ass,” Eiji’s face now is visibly irritated. It’s not like the playful pouts or growls he’d give when he’s teased about his English, this one is very clearly genuine.

“I was _worried_ about you, you shit!” Ash shouts.

“And I didn’t mean to worry you!” Eiji returns his tone. “But it’s not your place to tell me what I can and can’t do.”

“I’m just trying to look out for you and keep you _safe_ —”

“Safe? From _what,_ Ash?” The secret annoyance is out now, and Eiji decides it’s just best to lay it all out on the table for the man to see. “It’s been _months_ since you’ve left New York and _nothing_ has happened to you or me!”

Surprise is not the last emotion that Ash is feeling in that instant. “You don’t know these people, Eiji. They could strike at literally any _time_ —”

“They shot me as a warning. I’m pretty sure I have an _idea,_ ” Eiji takes a deep breath and halfway rolls his eyes, his line of sight now stuck at the ceiling. He takes a moment, before he just turns back to Ash and decides they need to start calming down. “You really need to unwind yourself, Aslan. It’s over.”

_“Don’t call me that.”_

There’s a special type of silence that comes immediately after a gunshot wound. This same type of silence plagued their apartment the moment these words were said. There’s a moment, where the two of them just stare at each other, unable to say anything more.

“What?” Eiji asks, his voice genuinely shocked now.

“Don’t call me that, Eiji,” Ash decides to stick with his statement.

“Why?” The question is genuine. “You never had a problem with it before.”

“Because you only say it when I start to freak out,” Ash snaps at him. He’s not at all stupid, it definitely didn’t take long for him to figure this out. “I’m not freaking out. I’m not fucking crazy.”

“I never said you were crazy, Ash, Jesus Christ.”

Suddenly, both of his names are extremely irritating. It’s as if he didn’t want to exist under either pseudonym at all. “But you only call me by Aslan while I am, because you think that changing my name is going to make it _all_ better!”

“Quit putting thoughts in my head that is not at all what’s going on,” Eiji’s face was originally unreadable, but now the expression is very clear: offended.

“Then what _is_ going on, Eiji?” Ash snaps. This is it, voices are definitely raised now. “Why shouldn’t I be worried about you?”

“I literally just told you why!” Eiji isn’t someone to get angry easily, but because of this fact he recognises it instantly when he does. And he is. He needs to be left alone for a while before he starts getting hurtful. He never could handle fights in any form. “You know what, leave me alone. I’m going to cool down for a little while.”

He turns, going to leave, but Ash stops him, grabbing him roughly by his arm before he can even reach for the door. It’s not a painful grasp, but it’s enough to where it causes something in Eiji to just snap. He turns back to Ash, his voice dark and low now.  

“Let me go, Aslan,” it’s as if he learned how to shape words into physical daggers and the very notion of speaking is what causes him to stab.  

The tone hits Ash somewhere harsh. “You’re not going anywhere.”

“Let me go, or I’ll _scream._ ”

Ash gives him this look, the fire in his eyes long past ignition now. They’ve found their line and they’ve each crossed it, so much so that they’re waving to each other on the other side. “So that’s how you see me?” He squeezes tighter. “Just as another one of those monsters? Is that really what you think of me?”

Eiji does not answer with anything except holding up his threat – he screams.

Ash quickly brings a hand up and covers his mouth with such an intense force the back of Eiji’s head smacks against the wall. Stars tingle the corners of his vision, but they go away after a brief second of being left alone.

Eiji is _really_ screaming now, and Ash just holds onto him tighter. Neither of them know how Eiji manages to break out, but the next thing Eiji finds is his mind controlling his body at an anxiety-inducing pace. He slips a knife out of the kitchen drawer and points it at Ash. “Stay _back_ and _away from me_ , or I’ll hurt myself!” Eiji doesn’t have control over his own words at this point anymore. His mind is just running with a million different ways to get Ash to leave him alone so he can breathe. It isn’t working.

Ash’s heart stops, and he stares at Eiji now with a look mixed with shock and intense worry. Then, he’s _scared._ Eiji’s heart practically shatters at the way Ash’s eyes shake. Ash doesn’t know what to do or think, but he remembers his own phone being charged. He fumbles to pull it out and immediately calls the police.

_Now_ things are going insane.

Immediately, Eiji tosses the knife into the sink and runs after Ash with a near breakneck speed. Ash turns away immediately, yelling his emergency in broken Japanese to the other side of the line. “Don’t! Don’t call them!” He shouts, loudly, landing on Ash’s back as he tries to reach for the phone. Ash is pushing him back however he can to keep him off and away. “Hang up, Ash, _please!_ ”

It’s too late.

When the police arrive, it’s immediately not a pretty scene. It looks bad. It looks crazy. It looks like a household with common abuse when it reality they both just escalated from a really bad day.

An officer has to pry Eiji off of Ash’s back and the two of them are separated. Ash is taken outside and into the police car, and Eiji is left with another officer alone in the apartment.

Ash is used to police cars and being stuck in one of them, but for some reason – _this_ one, this car scared him the most. He’s doing his best to speak despite how absolutely terrified he looks and sounds, but he knows if something goes wrong, one of them is going to be arrested.

Eiji doesn’t recall what he ends up telling the officer in their apartment. But he does remember how grey and empty the rooms suddenly look, how the walls that they made suddenly seem to be crumbling apart. He doesn’t want that. He doesn’t want to let any of it go.

Thankfully, they don’t.

The officers come to a verdict by the end of their fight, and that’s when they bring Ash back inside. In this moment, Eiji runs into his arms, and the two of them hold on as tight as they can. Yet as life has always been, there is no such thing as an ending that came too easy. They have to hold each other, listening to what they have to be told – and it’s that they have to pull apart again for the night.

At first, Eiji tries to fight them being separated, but he’s cut off with a very swift sentence: “either one of you leaves, or you’re both arrested.”

Ash swallows hard. He gives Eiji this look that’s so lost in terrible thoughts, and that’s when Eiji has to take the fall. “I’ll leave.”

Ash holds onto him tighter.

“I’ll be okay,” Eiji says to him, his eyes misty now. “I’ll just go to Ibe’s.” He turns to the officer that originally had to speak. “When will I be able to come back?”

“It’s just for tonight,” they say. “You can return in the morning.”

Eiji takes in a shaky breath, then turns back to Ash before he leans in on his tiptoes to kiss him softly. Ash does not hesitate to return back the moment, but this moment is only that – a moment. All moments have a beginning and an end, and it’s unfortunate for the two of them where the middle of this moment is only a few seconds.

“This isn’t your fault, Aslan,” Eiji says finally, his voice sincere. “Not at all.”

Aslan’s voice cracks. “I’m so sorry—"

“Don’t be. It’s okay. We’ll be okay. I’ll see you in the morning,” He hugs him tightly, one more time, before he has to let go entirely. “I love you.”

Aslan doesn’t remember if he properly responded or when they all had to leave, but he does remember the next few moments of pure silence where he’s alone, in their apartment, completely and entirely distraught.

_Water all around I never learned how to swim now._

 

Eiji’s knocking on the apartment door just as dawn breaks.

Ash opens the door almost immediately, his eyes red and puffy and it’s painfully clear that neither of them have slept since what had happened just a few hours before. Their eyes met somewhere on a tightrope, and their movements are as fluid as an assembly line. When they find each other in their arms, that’s when they let themselves fall.

Their knees barely have the strength to keep them up, all the energy they contain is used just to tightly hold each other and to cry it all out. With these tears, here’s no panic, in fact, there’s not much of any tone that it contains it all.

Relief could be easily placed here, but relief is not quite right. Regret doesn’t fit, either, with their attempts at apologies that are shut down faster than lightning they decide not to place an emotion to it at all, just to let it out.

So they do.

Eiji’s the only one that manages to form coherent sentences outside of constant apologies and broken “I love you” variants.

“It’s okay. It’s going to be okay. It’s going to get better,” were some of the highlights. What Ash didn’t expect, however, was the final sentence, the real changer, that caused him to just forget words altogether through his sobs.

_“You’re getting better.”_

 

_If being wrong’s a crime, I’m serving forever. If being strong’s your kind then I need help here with this feather._

Eiji is the first person that Ash could kiss and not immediately proceed to vomit in his mouth.

They’re halfway naked, their arms pulling apart the clothes on their body and fumbling with it as if zippers and buttons were puzzles themselves. Eiji is mumbling words now, something to help build the mood and to reassure Ash that it’s okay to stop at any time. He doesn’t want to.

He plants a kiss on Ash’s neck, taking his sweet time there despite Ash’s soft whimper and pleas to hurry up and continue what they were doing. Eiji brings his hands down and start to fumble with his belt, pulling away just to look at Ash with heavy breathing.

“Goddamn,” Eiji whispers softly. He pauses, taking a hand and cradling Ash’s pink face, stroking his cheek and brushing his fingers through his hair. “You’re so beautiful.”

And here is where the mistake is made.

Ash instantly is overwhelmed with an intense urge to vomit. The sickness that overcomes him is not because of Eiji at all, but because of the word. That beautiful, beautiful word – a word that has been ripped away from its original meaning and torn to pieces because of Aslan Callenreese.

Men that didn’t belong to him took this word and they spat it in his face as they forced themselves upon him. Grown adults, looking down on this child, this _child,_ with every intention of something vile would mutate this word and speak it with the most disgusting inflection off their tongues.

Ash Lynx is not beautiful. He is a _toy._

He lurches, trying to hold himself together, but Eiji immediately backs off of him and knows to stop right there. “What was it?” He asks, wanting to make sure not to do it again.

“Beautiful,” Ash spits. “It’s fucking _beautiful._ ”

Words cannot describe how much he hates this word. And the fact that Eiji, of all people, had just said this to him is what really fires up the hurt.

“How dare you say something so fucking ridiculous and make it sound like the truth?”

Eiji stammers, unsure how to properly respond – he doesn’t have the time to. Instead, he just blurts out the first thing that comes to mind, a genuine, honest compliment. “Because…it is the truth. Because you are.” He notices the look in Ash’s eye, and he quickly adds something as if it would be of any help. “At least, to me.”

Ash looks away from him, staring off the bed and onto the floor now, watching the carpet start to flow around like water. Is he crying? He can’t tell if he is, or if he’s genuinely going to throw up.

Either way, he punches the mattress as hard as he can, nothing hurt except the ache in his chest. “God _damn_ it!” He cries. “I’m supposed to be getting _better!_ This is supposed to be getting _better_!”

Eiji is used to the cries. He’s used to the weeping. What he’s not used to, however, is his response to this trauma being _angry_.

“Progress isn’t overnight, Aslan,” Eiji says.

That doesn’t stop Aslan from absolutely hating himself. “This is supposed to feel good. This is supposed to change. I’m supposed to get better.”

“And you _are,_ ” Eiji confirms this. “You made it this far. Hell, it looked like we were going to make it farther if I hadn’t said anything. But even still! It’s further than last time.” At this point, he doesn’t think that Ash will ever truly replace all those years of sexual abuse with Eiji, but the fact he’s even trying is enough to tell him just how far he’s come. Just how much he wants to show his love – but what he doesn’t know is that it’s already shown. Sex is never needed.

The dampness on Ash’s cheeks now are hot, but it’s harshly wiped away by his palms. He debates, before pushing himself up and staring at Eiji dead in the eyes. “Say it to me again.”

“What?”

“Beautiful. Say I’m beautiful again,” he commands lightly. It’s clear he’s not exactly thinking straight, his anger clouding his mind in a way that’s almost self-destructive.

“Aslan, I—I don’t think—”

“ _Say_ _it_.”

Eiji has to pause, before he just takes a deep breath, staring at him for a moment. He knows if he throws the words out it won’t hit quite the same, so it has to come from somewhere sincere. He doesn’t even want to say it at all at this rate, but he trusts that Ash will tell him to stop if need be.

“You’re beautiful,” he says finally.

Ash gags. It’s stopped by him forcing himself to cringe, and he swallows it down. He takes a shaking breath and then shakes his head. “I can’t. I can’t do it,” his voice cracks. He grabs the closest thing to him – his denim jacket bundled up on the corner of the bed – and throws it as hard as he can with a yell. He hates this. He hates all of this. He hates how just one word will send him spiralling into pieces that he can’t quite replace. He’s not going to cry. He _refuses_ to cry again in front of Eiji. Not again.

“It’s okay,” Eiji tells him. He’s right.

Ash just has to take a deep breath through this. Maybe he’ll overcome this word. Maybe he’ll learn to like it. But for now? “Just…don’t call me that, please.”

Eiji is happy to comply. There’s a million different things he could choose to say about Ash, so it’ll be easy for him to drop the word beautiful. There were other compliments to pay. He doesn’t say anything at this point, just opening his arms, watching Ash crawl into them with a moderate speed.

Eiji just pets his hair back and plants a kiss on top of his head, whispering how everything is okay, and deciding to immediately replace his past words with a new compliment – something he has never been called before.

“You are so, so _strong_ , Aslan,” he says. “Look how strong you’ve grown to be.”

 

_If being afraid is a crime, we hang side by side, at the swinging party down the line._

Ash never thought about how sickeningly ironic it is that Eiji works by using a camera. He never really thought about this – until at one particular point at home where he’s just being playful, but the shutter sound reminds him once again of all that was left behind.

Laughing. Laughing like hyenas.

_Click._

_Click._

_Click._

_Click—_

“Stop,” Ash screams. Loud. “ _Stop!_ ”

Eiji freezes, holding the camera still and his smile instantly fading away. He wasn’t there that night – he doesn’t know. Ash has to remind himself of this, and he has to make sure that Eiji isn’t startled before he briefly explains this particular trigger that they hadn’t encountered together before.

“I’m sorry,” Eiji says, sincere.

Ash shakes his head. “You damn idiot. It’s not your fault.”

Eiji is careful in pulling the camera strap over his head and tuck it in his bag, sealing it tight and just putting it away altogether. He didn’t expect this to be a problem, but at the same time, there’s a lot of things he’s yet to know and be told. So he waits for when Ash is alright with sharing them – even if he never gets told, that’s alright too.

“It hasn’t bothered me since I was a kid,” Ash confesses, eyebrows furred together as he keeps his eyes fixated on the table. His leg is bouncing. That’s new, too. “I don’t get why it’s bothering me now.”

Eiji thinks on it for a moment, before he just shrugs. “It may just be because you’re recovering.” Of course, he’s right. He’s always right about this. Eiji has this hidden talent of somehow knowing exactly what to say – and he doesn’t understand why.

Camera clicks were something he’s had to numb to get by, so now that Ash has the time to sit and address all his problems and work through them one by one, it makes sense now that this isn’t going to be left behind. But unlike sex or a simple word, he’s going to push through this one. He isn’t going to let everything win to him.

“Take pictures, but not of me,” Ash requests, simply. “I want to get used to the sound. I want to move the sound to you.”

Eiji hesitates, but he looks Ash in the eye and he knows that he’s being serious, so he inhales sharply and rummages back to his bag. “How close do you want me to be?” He asks softly. Ash has to think.

“Stay in the same room,” he decides. “Talk to me, too. Maybe that’ll help if I hear the camera going off to your voice instead of…” he doesn’t finish. They both know the rest of the sentences.

Eiji nods once, then powers the camera back on. He wanders to the breakfast bar, pulling the basket of fruits closer to the focus before he glances at Ash. “I’m going to start, okay? Stop me at any time.”

Ash hums, and he closes his eyes.

The first shutter clicks, and Ash audibly has to clench his teeth and hiss. He doesn’t open his eyes, but his fists clench, and thank god he bites all his nails off – they would have dug into his skin.

Eiji sighs. “Ash, please, you don’t have to put yourself through this—”

“—Keep _going_ ,” he demands. “This is fine. I’m fine. What picture did you take?”

He’s not calm. He’s not lying. Eiji is torn in a million different directions but he decides to comply for now. He’ll know when it’s over. He takes one more picture, his eyes darting to Ash immediately, who inhales sharply. “It’s of our fruit basket. The one with all the fake fruits. Why did you get that, anyway?”

Open the conversation. That’s smart. “It’s cliché,” Ash chuckles. In the height of his giggle Eiji takes another picture, trying to associate the sound with proper laughter – not something sickening. Ash winces, but he continues, eyes still closed. “We don’t have a lot of decorations and I always thought a bowl of fruit was silly.”

“Why silly?” Eiji asks. He turns the bowl, pausing for a moment before he takes a picture. Ash learns his pattern at this moment – every six seconds.

“Be more sporadic in the pictures,” Ash tells him bluntly. The photos taken of him as a child didn’t have a pattern, so neither should Eiji’s. He continues. “But like, every ‘modern house’ you see in America has a bowl of fruit. Like, real fruit. I never understood real fruit. It would go bad in a few days and you’re wasting money replacing it.”

Two pictures now, within a second of each other. Ash holds in a soft gasp, but the discomfort on his face is clear. “So is that why you got the fake fruits?” He takes another picture, making sure that Ash doesn’t get too uncomfortable. The moment he starts shaking, that’s when he’ll know for sure to force Ash to stop with this. No shaking.

“It also looks tacky,” Ash nods, both of his legs bouncing now, from his toes. “I like tacky.”

Eiji laughs lightly, taking a picture as he does, then another one as his laugh dies down some. He’s not even paying attention to what his camera is capturing at this point, only watching the boy at the table, struggling to open his eyes and breathe.

“I thought you’d be more of a classy décor kind of person,” Eiji comments, another picture – this one for sure aimed at the ceiling.

Ash shakes his head quickly. “I fucking _hate_ classy shit.” It’s the harshest he’s been in a while, and Eiji can only assume why. He has to change the subject fast, not wanting Ash to start thinking of Dino Golzine while trying to work through trauma. He doesn’t blame Ash for a second, either, Eiji would probably spit on wealth too if he had been forced through it the way Ash had.

“I’m going to move to take pictures over here,” he says, walking past Ash to take pictures of the tiny plants on their windowsill, but he’s stopped.

“Turn the camera to me,” he says, eyes shut tightly. “Take pictures of me.”

“Ash—”

“— _Trust me,_ please.”

Eiji isn’t scared of Ash. He’s never been scared of Ash. He is scared, however, of what Ash can do – specifically, to himself. Even still, Eiji complies, carefully sitting next to him at the table and propping the camera up on his elbows. “Not the face,” Eiji says simply. He takes a deep breath as the camera focuses on his fingers. “Ready?”

Ash nods, and with the sound of the camera shutter going off he curls in on himself for a moment, before he pushes him back up straight. “What did you take?”

“Your hands,” Eiji replies honestly. He has an idea that may help, but he isn’t so sure. He tucks his fingers into the palm of Ash’s hand, holding as best as he can there in hopes that it will help ground him. It does. He takes a picture of this, too. “Have you ever painted your nails before?”

Ash giggles – cut short by a photograph – before he takes a deep breath. “I don’t think I have,” he thinks for a moment. He squeezes Eiji’s hand tighter when he hears the camera once again. “Have you?”

Eiji laughs through his camera clicks. There were three in unison there. “Of course I have,” he holds Ash’s hand through the next photograph again. “I have a little sister. She painted _everyone’s_ nails.”

“That’s cute,” Ash comments, a small smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. “What colour were they? Black?”

“I wish,” Eiji chuckles. That would have made him cool, or at least think he looked cool. Ash would never have the heart to tell him black isn’t a colour that suits his personality. He’d have to find the most roundabout way to say it, but they haven’t run into that yet. “She mixed her pink and yellow and my nails became the most ugly ass shade of orange you could make.”

Ash laughs, loud and bright – and through the camera shutters. Eiji doesn’t comment on it, not wanting to potentially jinx it and ruin the moment, but the joy that flutters through his body sparks its way to Ash.

Eiji takes one more picture, and he notices that Ash’s reaction is a little more mild. His legs are still bouncing, but not at the same intensity as it was before. Some traumas for Ash take weeks and months to try and work past – some of which are _still_ in progress – but this? This he’s masterfully handling within an hour of a day.

“I’m moving up to your chest,” Eiji warns him, and Ash only nods to it. He takes a picture, then pauses. “Is that my shirt?”

“Maybe,” Ash smirks, opening his eyes now. Eiji has to pause, looking into his eyes with surprise for a moment before he just blushes a shade of pink. He fumbles with his camera for a moment, before Ash finally reaches over and rests his fingers underneath the lens as if it were a chin, tilting it upwards to where it’s on his eyes. “Try this part of me.”

Eiji hesitates, their eyes locked in a way that hasn’t been this connected since the prison. Then he returns the look he’s given, before he takes the picture.

Ash blinks, hard, holding himself together before he looks back at the camera with a look in his eye. The faint glint that says to it: _you will not defeat me._ And it does not.

“I have a better idea,” Eiji tells him, standing from his chair and pushing their seats closer together. He sits again, tantalisingly close, almost awkward in the way they’re sitting, and he turns the viewfinder on the camera so he can see where they’re looking. Ash realises what he’s doing almost immediately.

The first two pictures spark a reaction out of Ash, but when Eiji decides that in-between the third and fourth to plant a childish kiss directly onto Ash’s cheek, he melts. He flushes a deep shade of red and turns back to Eiji, taking his face in his hands and pulling him close. Tangling their arms, they kiss again, and with each moment where their lips touch Eiji is sure to take a photo of this. Ash doesn’t seem to notice. He doesn’t seem to care.

This was it. This was what he needed.

By the time they pull apart they’re both gasping for air, the love in their eyes captured by the camera clicking, but it’s nothing like seeing it in person. Ash doesn’t even flinch, staring at Eiji with the most tender look in his eyes that these pictures just can’t quite articulate on their own. You’d have to be in the room. You’d have to be there to feel it – and even then, nobody can truly feel it quite like Eiji can, because it’s only for Eiji. It’s not for anybody else.

Eiji glances at the camera for a moment, before he pulls it close and takes a direct picture of Ash’s face, and he just giggles. “You’re hiding your face because it’s red again.” He carefully leans forward and takes the camera from Eiji, smirking slightly and taking a picture of the photographer’s face and marvelling at how wonderfully the camera has captured his blush.

He sets the camera down on the table, looking back at Eiji and smiling. “Thank you,” is all he says before he tenderly grabs him again by his cheeks and pulls him in for more.

The camera stares onward, past these two lover boys and focusing on something greater, something only they can share. It’s enough for Ash to move forward. It’s enough for him to get the job done.

Eiji never deletes these pictures.

_At the swinging party down the line._

With each issue being addressed one by one, Ash has come to a conclusion he never quite realised before. Almost every issue he’s had to face came from Ash and not from Aslan. Sure, Aslan has had his own issues to face, but Ash is not Aslan. Aslan is not Ash.

The fact is he’s being drawn closer and closer to Aslan than he ever has to Ash. His soul and entire entity of being is reclaiming back a name he so desperately pushed away to keep the little boy safe. But he does not need to protect this child anymore. He does not need to hide him from the world.

Ash Lynx is holding him back, and he needs to say goodbye. He needs to let him go.

When Eiji comes home that evening and finds the man with – with a _look_ in his eyes, he’s not sure where to place it. He asks what’s the matter, and he’s only greeted with an awkward grunt as his reply.

“Did something happen?” Eiji asks, thinking for a moment. “Did you mess up your Japanese in public?” That tends to annoy him the most.

He shakes his head, turning to him. “Can you call me Aslan?”

Immediately, Eiji assumes the worst. He’s fumbling around with his jacket now to push it off and hurry into the boy’s arms, but he’s waved off.

“Just, from now on. Instead of Ash,” he explains a little further. “Can you stick with Aslan for me?”

Eiji blinks, but then he just shrugs with a nod. A part of him is still thinking that something is wrong, but he doesn’t want to pry if he’s telling him not to worry about it. They’re still figuring out this system, but they seem to be getting the hang of it.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” He decides, just to make sure. At first, there isn’t a response, so Eiji has to get his attention. “Aslan?”

He just nods. “I’m sure.”

“You don’t look so sure.”

“I’m just processing this,” Aslan confesses. “There’s a lot that I want to do. A lot of progress to make—”

“What did I tell you,” Eiji interrupts politely. “When you first told me you wanted to work on this?”

Aslan pauses. He knows. Very well. “One day at a time.”

Eiji nods. That’s correct. “One day at a time, Aslan.”

And this is how Aslan walks – one day. Baby steps, long strides, all of it taken apart and worked with only one day at a time.

 

_Bring your own lampshade, somewhere there’s a party._

 

Sometimes, it hits him at how close he came to death that night.

A part of him thinks he’s caught in his own little perfect form of heaven, where he’s long since died and he’s spending all of eternity doing what he’d wish he had done. But then he remembers one particular Bible study from Cape Cod:

**_Ezekiel 28:26_ **

_“‘They will live there in safety and will build houses and plant vineyards; they will live in safety when I inflict punishment on all their neighbours who maligned them. Then they will know that I am the LORD their God.’”_

**_Luke 23:43_ **

_“Jesus answered him, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.’”_

Heaven. Safety. _Paradise_. There is no suffering or pain of any kind in this side of paradise. Then why does Aslan suffer? If this is truly heaven, why are he and Eiji alone? Where is Griffin? Where is Skip? Where is Shorter? Why do just he and Eiji get to suffer in this side of paradise while the promise of heaven is somewhere out of reach?

Then he remembers: this is not heaven. He is not dead.

Is he? Or is he just stuck in a purgatory where he has to fight to earn his way up to heaven? Will he even manage to make it there, or will he always remain one step away? He had heard a song once on the train, some boy singing something about love, but a certain strand of lyrics caught him somewhere in his head and now the fragments replay broken ever since.

_Without losing a piece of me, how do I get to heaven?_

Aslan does not understand this path to heaven. He doesn’t seem to know that he’s not even caught somewhere between heaven and hell, that he is in no purgatory – just on Earth.

Yet, there are some nights where Earth doesn’t feel like Earth anymore.

Eiji shifts slightly in the bed, his eyes only lightly closed. The boy is still very clearly awake, despite the night trying to lull them both to sleep. Aslan does not even stir his eyes.

He reaches over, pulling Eiji onto his chest, running his fingers through his hair and staring up at the ceiling. In response to this, Eiji just hums, glancing up at Aslan with this faint glint of exhaustion in his eye. “What’s wrong?” he asks.

Aslan shakes his head. “I’m just having a hard time falling asleep. You make it easier for me.”

“What’s keeping you from falling asleep?” Eiji asks, knowing Aslan well enough at this point to know when he’s beating around the bush for a question. He rests his chin on his chest, now giving him his attention.

Aslan thinks carefully on his answer, but then realises there’s no indirect way to go about it. He sighs. “A part of me still feels like I died back at the library,” he confesses. “That they didn’t find me fast enough and I had bled out.”

Eiji sits up now, giving Aslan his full, undivided attention. This type of attention is dangerous – the kind that would carve through mountains with bare hands alone. It’s the type of attention that brought leaders to their knees, dynasties into memories, and Aslan Callenreese into holding his breath.

“What makes you think that?” He asks calmly.

Aslan swallows. He doesn’t quite know. It’s just an odd feeling he frequently has, but he’s never had the chance to address it fully just yet. Now he has no other choice, no other chance. They’re addressing it now. Together.

“I just came really close to dying, you know,” his voice drops. “I mean, they even said I had flatlined for a moment—”

“—But you’re not dead,” Eiji says. It feels obvious and they know this, but this kind of existential crisis is hard enough on a human as is, much less a human that had literally been pulled back into a heartbeat.

Aslan remains quiet.

Eiji immediately plummets his head back onto Aslan’s chest with a soft _oof_ from him. He raises his head for a moment, trying to figure out what he’s doing and why he’s moving all around, but then once he stops, he realises. The heartbeat. He’s found it.

Aslan rolls his head back, staring at the ceiling again for a moment before he finally exhales, asking the question out loud. “Do you hear it?”

“Loud and clear, Aslan.”

_So, I really am alive?_

Eiji tries to remain awake as long as he can, but the sound of Aslan’s heartbeat lulls him to sleep after they both stop talking. Aslan’s eyes just wander to the side, staring out into the moonlight, where he’s forever reminded that the sunrise will always come sometime.

 

_Here it’s never ending, can’t remember when it started._

 

As quickly as Aslan seems to be grasping the Japanese language, he still asks for lessons with Eiji. Eiji doesn’t mind – in between chapters and with their shared free time they’re sitting at the dining room table, each writing with a notebook in hand. It’s mostly questions Aslan has about the material or random vocabulary the textbook doesn’t have just yet.

As much as he teases Eiji about his skills in English – it’s in Japanese where the teasing is equally returned. One that hit him the hardest was a backhanded comment in response to the teasing one morning, where Eiji had just mumbled: “you’re a literal genius but you can’t tell the difference between a city and a gremlin?”

Aslan has yet to come back with a wittier response to that one.

There’s no witty roasts today, however. It’s almost strictly language lessons, and it’s here where they notice at home they speak this interesting blend of English and Japanese. Some phrases don’t quite translate, or some word doesn’t hold the same power – either way, they’ve married the languages when they have any conversation at this point.

One of these phrases Aslan had taught himself on his own, learning from various books in the library and whatever translators he could find. This phrase he wanted to say to Eiji at the right place and right time. Sure, they’ve said it a lot in English, but the equivalent in Japanese is not at all the same – the _power_ behind it in Japanese is almost unspeakable.

It’s almost exclusive to being said at weddings, or deathbeds – extreme situations where the emotions are already heightened and need this extra light. Yet, with Eiji, he doesn’t need to wait to say this phrase for these kind of events.

He means it in English. He means it in Japanese. No phrase, not even in Japanese, carry the same intensity as the way Aslan feels.

They’re wrapping up when Aslan decides to stop Eiji for a brief extra second, carefully holding him by his arm. Their eyes meet, and that’s when the phrase runs across his head like a lit-up Times Square screen.

愛してる

_Aishiteru_. Ai. Shi. Te. Ru.

“I learned a new phrase, by myself,” he says softly, pink tinging at the edge of his cheekbones and prodding into his eyes. “I want to say it to you.”

Eiji smiles, almost like a parent would when being shown a creation from their child. It’s a smile that says that this picture is going up on the fridge. “Sure,” he says, the innocence in his voice only makes Aslan that much more soft. “What is it?”

_“I love you.”_

The phrase hits Eiji square in the chest and his breath stops as if he didn’t even know how to breathe to begin with. His eyes widen just slightly. He knows the power behind those three words. He especially knows the intensity they contain in Japanese.

“That’s quite a heavy form of the phrase,” Eiji’s breath hitches, almost wanting to blame this on a mere mistranslation, but he knows Aslan well enough. He knows when he’s done his research and when he’s deliberate. This is about as deliberate as it could get, but it’s a phrase he’s never been told before – not one he’d ever expect to hear within his lifetime, especially not from someone the likes of Aslan.

“I know,” Aslan says, finally. He swallows hard. “And I mean it.”

This time, it’s Eiji’s turn to run into Aslan’s arms and cry. The tears don’t come at first, but they just start to arrive without any other indication or warning. At first, Aslan almost panics, thinking he said something wrong or maybe he mistranslated or maybe culturally that is not at all what that means, but it all melts away the moment Eiji’s holding onto him as tightly as he can, crying into his chest, telling him over and over the same thing.

_“I love you, Aslan. I love you.”_

Same language. Same intensity.

 

_Pass around the lampshade there’ll be plenty enough room in jail._

 

Eiji doesn’t see the wild lynx coming as he’s attacked from behind with kisses and playful tickles.

“Oh my _god,_ Aslan!” Eiji screeches, dropping the clothes he’s holding. The wild lynx cackles in response as he turns the boy around to kiss all over his face better. When the initial shock of the attack simmers out, all that remains is the two of them, giggling with glee as they forget about the clothes in the dryer. The washer still hums proud. “Care to explain what that was about?” Eiji giggles.

“I got the job,” Aslan smiles genuinely. And it’s at that moment where the joy is contagious now. A few weeks prior he had applied to be a detective solving sex trafficking crimes – especially the ones targeting children – and he had just finished his final interview today. He starts next week before noon.

“That’s amazing!” Eiji beams, grabbing him by his arms and jumping a few times. Aslan can only giggle back. “No, really, that’s incredible.”

They kiss again, fully, now, and in-between the happiness and sound of birds from the open window outside, they can taste a hint of lime. The beaming sunlight rains summertime on their shoulders – it was just last year when they had initially ever met. To think, within the timespan of a year, Ash Lynx would cease to exist, while Aslan Callenreese—

“I thought you’d like that,” he laughs, his voice light. He would be lying if he didn’t think about how this would affect his progress, but at the same time, he also had thought about the countless children he’d save from ever having to make progress to begin with – then he decided it was all worth whatever trauma he has to relive.

The shitty radio had been moved from their bedroom down to their little laundry room, now, and it’s here where the commercial breaks from its reign and the music comes alive once again.  

It’s a little song they had heard only once before – New York, in their apartment over there, during one morning where they held each other and swayed. It was one of the smallest of gestures, but it was enough for them to know that they have each other. That everything is okay.

Until it wasn’t.

Until it was again.

They seem to share the same thought, now, with Aslan carefully pulling Eiji against his chest and holding his hands. They’re chest to chest, now, heartbeats and breathing on the same plane – it’s Aslan that takes the first step here.

They do not sway anymore. There is too much joy in this room to simply sway. Here, they dance. They dance because life is good again. They dance because there is no other action that’s quite as fitting. They dance because it tells the world everything they want to say, and they never have to use any words. They dance because their days are filled with love and with joy, and every day is worth being alive.

They’re supposed to be doing laundry.

 

_If being wrong’s a crime, I’m serving forever. If being strong is what you want then I need help here with this feather._

“I’m thinking about growing out my hair.”

Aslan looks up from his book, noticing a look on Eiji’s face that’s caught somewhere between a pout and deep thought. He only chuckles at this. “Where’s this coming from?”

Eiji shrugs. “It’s grown a bit since we met, and I’m starting to like how it feels.” He absentmindedly runs his fingers through his hair, thinking on how long he might want it to be.

Aslan rummages around in the drawer for something, using an expired coupon as a bookmark before he closes the book he’s reading and he sets it off to the side. He pats on the couch seat next to him for Eiji to sit there. He does. “It’s up to you what you do with it, love.” He’s being honest, but he’s also using a nickname. Those are new – probably within the last couple weeks or so. “Worst case scenario you can just cut it.”

“You make this sound so easy,” Eiji sighs dramatically. Aslan holds in a laugh. “It’s not funny. It’s serious.”

“It’s _hair._ ”

“But it’s a big deal!”

“Eiji, it’s _hair,_ ” Aslan laughs out loud, now. “You act like hair length is a factor in what I think of you.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be attracted to me, though?” Eiji asks. His tone reveals it all, and that’s when Aslan just chuckles and leans forward to plant a soft kiss in between those sparkling eyes.

Their eyes meet, and Eiji suddenly feels silly even asking. “You’re right,” he mumbles.

“Of course I’m right,” Aslan laughs, leaning back to where he was and smiling back at him. “You’re so ridiculous and I love you.”

Eiji pouts for a moment, before he tips his nose upward in a playful manner. It’s the same sort of silly intimidation he would do when he’d puff out his chest and lift his elbows up – not at all threatening, almost intentionally adorable in every way. “I’ll give you something to laugh about if you keep that up.”

Aslan raises an eyebrow and smirks. “Oh yeah? Try me,” he dares.

Eiji follows through with it. Instantly, his fingers fly across the couch and plunge into Aslan’s sides, moving like dozens of baby spiders. _Now_ Aslan is painfully laughing, trying to swat away at Eiji’s hands as best as he can without exposing his sides further.

He shrieks, and decides maybe it’s best if he tries to escape the tickling wrath on his body. He pushes himself off the couch and onto the ground, which only provides him a moment of relief – that is, until Eiji catches up to him and pushes himself between his legs, continuing his merciless tickle torture on the boy’s body.

“Eiji! Eiji!” Aslan shrieks through his laughing cries. “Eiji, stop!”

Eiji’s laughing with him, now, continuing to tickle at every little area he had discovered sensitive months before. He doesn’t give him some witty comeback, he just keeps his hands in a general place, scurrying all around his chest and sides and whatever exposed skin that could be ticklish.

“Eiji, _yamero!_ ” Aslan cackles loud and bright, tears wanting to prick at the corners of his eyes but finally Eiji stops just in time before it happens. They take a moment, just working out their giggle fits and heavy breathing, before finally he playfully hits Eiji on the chest.

“You little shit,” he laughs. “Grow your fucking hair out. I’m gonna pull it.”

_If being afraid is a crime, we hang side by side, at the swinging party down the line._

 

Aslan’s chest is light. When he breathes, there’s recovery, there’s quietness, there’s the ever-present fluorescent reminder that he’s _here_ and _alive_. It’s a simple reminder, but it’s also a reminder of where he’s been, a reminder of how far he’s come, a reminder of how far he’s going to be.

Everything is completely, fully, okay.

“Your singing is nice,” Aslan says, finally, prompting Eiji to blush a deep shade of red. “I’m serious. You should sing more. It’s lovely.”

“Does it help you?” Eiji asks, and Aslan nods. He pauses, then huffs. “I’ll think about it.”

Aslan can only chuckle. Everybody is self-conscious about something, and not even Eiji is exempt from that. So in the meantime he’s just going to do and say whatever he can to convince him of the otherwise. He loves his singing voice. He can see himself falling asleep to it in future times.

The room falls quiet for just a moment, the only view out the window is a sea’s collection of stars bumping into asteroids, the moon highlighting each face that stares or even peeks its way.

“I love you,” Aslan says, and he feels it entirely. “I love you, Eiji.”

His ears don’t pick up a response, but he knows there was one – he could feel it on his chest where Eiji’s head lays. Aslan’s fingers absentmindedly run through Eiji’s hair again, noticing how it’s grown, playfully tugging on one of the locks to be a tease. They giggle through it, but then fall quiet again.

“Can you really sing more for me, though?” Aslan asks, his voice almost childlike in his request. Eiji doesn’t know just how much power a voice can carry, and it’s Eiji’s voice in particular that always brings Aslan to his knees. “I really like how your voice sounds.”

Eiji doesn’t believe him entirely, but he does believe him halfway. Then again, another part of his mind tells him to believe all the way – that kind of faith is what brought them this far in the first place. “Do you?”

Aslan nods. “Of course I do.”

They gravitate to each other even closer, as if their very souls were trying to touch one another directly. They were so bound together – soul to soul. A permafrost of warmth strikes between their two hearts, and leaves them there for the night, tangled up in arms.

“Can you sing again?” Aslan finally whispers. “Just one more time. Then we’ll sleep.”

Eiji at first hesitates again, but then he remembers where they are, and who he’s with – who his heart belongs to, and who belongs in his heart. It’s almost like a child asking for an extra bedtime story to escape the world, but now this world does not need anywhere for him to escape to. There isn’t an anywhere, or an anyone, but there is _someone_. One someone.

Aslan will never know how incredible Eiji feels knowing that this one someone is him. Then again, perhaps he has an idea – to Eiji, Aslan is his one someone as well.

“One condition, then,” Eiji states finally.

“Okay.”

“You sing with me.”

Aslan smiles wide, squeezing tighter before planting a kiss in plain view of the moonlight. The moonlight doesn’t mind. “Of course, Eiji,” he replies. “You pick.”

They just decide to sing what Eiji sang originally alone before.

 

_At the swinging party down the line._


End file.
